Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished ManuscriptReview Method: Peer ReviewedAbstract: Theorizing the relationship between pornography and heterosexual men's investment in and enactment of hegemonic masculine practice—particularly overt sexism, the objectification of women, and violence against women—is longstanding and fraught territory in feminist research and activism. Drawing on interactional and post-structural theories of gender, I attempt to move beyond binary debates about whether or not pornography impacts heterosexual men's gender ideology or sexual practice to argue that pornography has a much more complex relationship to individual men's accomplishment of gender. Drawing on 15 in-depth life history interviews asking subjects to narrate their experiences of sexual learning, this article attempts to link debates about pornography to theories of gender, particularly theories of multiple masculinities. I argue not that pornography use has a direct causal relationship to gender outcomes, but that pornography use can become implicated in gender outcomes where pornography use and preferences are believed by individual men to signify inadequate or failed masculinity. I argue that where subjects did not feel their pornography use had any bearing on adequate or inadequate gender accomplishment, they experienced a greater security in departing from normative masculine forms over the life course, resulting in more egalitarian and pro-feminist gender ideology and sex practice. Where pornography use contributed to anxieties about inadequate or failed masculinity, subjects became more invested in the performance of normative masculinity and exhibited greater reluctance to depart from normative masculine forms over the life course. Implications for the maintenance of unequal gender relations are discussed.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished ManuscriptReview Method: Peer ReviewedAbstract: With a nine month ethnographic study as its basis, this paper is looking at the role transnational media flows play in the formation of local, class-specific cosmopolitan identities amongst the lower middle class youth of Cairo. By suggesting that cosmopolitanism should be understood as a form of internal heterogeneity; where through personal strategies and performance the global is made a part of our own local repertoires, this paper is arguing that it is lower middle class Egyptian youth who are more deserving of the cosmopolitan label. Through an intricate integration of Islamic discourse and Islamic media into their daily social practices, members of the lower middle class are engaged in the production of more dynamic cosmopolitanisms based on a happy negotiation between both local and global repertoires. Such unpredictable forms of cosmopolitanism are created through exclusion and belonging within different spaces of the city and media practice.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished ManuscriptAbstract: Youth play a key role in Māori language revival efforts. Since the birth of the first kura kaupapa Māori and its eventual secondary school extension, wharekura, a new generation has grown up as bilingual youth and young adults in Aotearoa New Zealand. Language choices and use among this generation provide an insightful glimpse into the future of the Māori language.

This paper looks at the influences that lead to Māori language use among youth, and in particular where, when and with whom they speak Māori. Drawing from a national online survey of 478 current and former wharekura students and interviews with 51 members from wharekura in the lower North Island region, it highlights the unique and complex identity of wharekura youth, their language use at home, at kura (school), in the wider community and modern cyber world.

Key influences include the role of family members, relationships with teachers and peers, the unique nature of Māori-medium schools and the complex and multi-faceted world in which wharekura youth straddle and navigate today. This provides important insights for educators, parents and practitioners involved in indigenous language revival efforts.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished ManuscriptReview Method: Peer ReviewedAbstract: What it means to be queer and undocumented in the United States is shifting. In part, this change is due to the increasing legal recognition of same-sex marriage and immigration reform, such as the renewal of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. A group of queer and undocumented activists—undocuqueers—are using their experiences as members of at least two marginalized groups to fight for immigrant and LGBTQ rights.

Despite their growing visibility, undocuqueers are underrepresented in sexualities and immigration research. Work that focuses on their subjectivity presents undocuqueers as homogenous subjects who are living “single issue lives” (Cardenas 2007). My paper addresses these gaps by examining how undocuqueers work to claim multiple identities, including non-normative sexuality, undocumented status and race. I suggest moving away from treating sexuality and immigration status as mutually exclusive entities—and instead I position queerness, undocumented status and race as constructing and constraining the reproduction of the undocuqueer’s identity.

Based on the analysis of six undocuqueers’ online narratives, I examine the intricacies and complexities of being undocumented, queer and non-white. In particular, I study the undocuqueer’s subjectivity as an effect of two contexts: the local (home, school and work) and the global (social, cultural and legal). In contrast with the current literature, I find that undocuqueers’ identification processes are non-linear and their visibility as undocumented and queer mutually inform one other. Unlike subjects who are either queer or undocumented, undocuqueers identify in larger, and often more marginalized, spaces of exclusion.